•MILITARY: Mexico’s Defense Ministry (SEDENA) is set to spend a record-setting budget in 2021 resulting from the large number of tasks that president Andrés Manuel López Obrador has assigned to the military since 2018 and that experts warn provides them with unprecedented influence.
•NUMBERS: Encompassing the Army and Air Force, SEDENA will enact in 2021 a budget equivalent to US $5.6 billion to cover for a long list of tasks including building a new airport and furnishing branch offices of a state-owned development bank. SEDENA’s budget in 2018 -they year López Obrador took office- was equivalent to US $4 billion.
•INTERESTS: “All the things that (SEDENA) is doing have nothing to do with security. They are tasks in which (the military) are directly taking over civilian functions of government, creating a bureaucracy and creating interests”, said Catalina Pérez Correa, researcher at CIDE in Mexico City.
•GENERAL: Last November, the US Department of Justice decided to drop drug trafficking charges against Mexico’s former Defense Minister, Salvador Cienfuegos, after a vigorous diplomatic effort by the López Obrador administration which analysts say showed the military’s influence.
